Survey of respiratory sounds in infants

Abstract

Background: Over the last decade there
has been an apparent increase in childhood
wheeze. We speculated that much of
the reported increase may be attributed to
the term wheeze being adopted by parents
to describe a variety of other forms of
noisy breathing.

Aims: To investigate terminology used by
parents to describe their children’s breath
sounds.

Methods: An interview was carried out
with the parents of 92 infants with noisy
breathing, beginning with an open question
and then directed towards a more
detailed description. Finally, the parents
were asked to choose from a wheeze,
ruttle, and stridor on imitation by the
investigator and video clips of children.

Results: Wheeze was the most commonly
chosen word on initial questioning (59%).
Only 36% were still using this term at the
end of the interview, representing a decrease
of one third, whereas the use of the
word ruttles doubled.

Conclusions: Our results reflect the degree
of inaccuracy involved in the use of
the term wheeze in clinical practice,
which may be leading to over diagnosis.
Imprecise use of this term has potentially
important implications for therapy and
clinical trials.